Countdown Day 28

Countdown 28 days to be...

To be -- here in New Zealand. Only 28 days left, one moon cycle left from when this journey began June 10th 2005. Embracing the end of this journey with sadness and joy. After being in bed for three days from a bad cold and scratchy throat probably received from a handshake from NF, a poet at the Newtown Community Center Friday night, I feel well enough to venture out for air. Although having an excuse for doing nothing but drinking ginger lemon tea and reading Pinter for long stretchers in bed hasn’t been so bad. Last Friday night the Word Collective recorded all the poets including an indescrible bit of a skit involving small animals and an operation on another poet by Susan Freeman and a new SCUM Manifesto by Kazz Funky Blue, artist/performer extraordinaire. And yes, that is her real legal name. Delightful. The Word Collective offered a CD from their previous event during the past Fringe Festival for only $5.00 in which I participated. At www.dadashopping.net there are photos of poets including me with the American flag/scarf wrapped around my eyes, a proud moment of poetry and patriotism.

My walk to the town of Plimmerton is a two-lane winding road, in parts not wide enough for two cars let alone a pedestrian, an alien to some kiwi drivers, and the view is a breathtaking wonder of sea and bush and trees including manaka, which provides a delicious honey, claimed to be very healing, and in which I was forced to break my vegan diet after moving here (when in Rome syndrome). It’s Fall here. Spring in The States. And although it is very cold there are new flowers sprouting everywhere. I plucked one or two flower heads from lavender bushes along the road and some jasmine that makes my entire home smell divine. In the dairy, operated by Indians like all over the world, I buy a paper because Tuesday is the TV guide day, although I only get two channels, which I watch religiously to study actors. If today is Tuesday then tonight is Boston Legal on the telly. Next to James Spader I am in love with Shatner and the Blonde, Candice Bergen because she’s not Hollywood skinny. If I could only look like her maybe I would have an audition in the morning for one of the Hollywood movies, which will be shot here because there really isn't an actors' union here. I auditioned for 30 nights of darkness and rehearsed for a week my scream when the vampire crashes through my kitchen window, but at the audition they said, look scared but don’t scream. I should have known. Auditions are so unpredictable.

I bought a bag of potato chips in the dairy. The bag said with ready salt in big red letters, what that means I have no idea, ready as opposed to what? Not ready salt? And I bought a bag of tangerines since I am still craving mass doses of vitamin C. My walk back I saw the sunset although NF said on the phone the sun never sets in Plimmerton but I forgot to ask him what that means. I plucked more lavender and a sprig of rosemary by the side of the up-hill road.

Vegetables are roasting as I write this. Kumara, a kiwi vegetable that is better than an ordinary potato along with the plucked rosemary making my entire home on the sea smell homey, reminding me of thanksgiving in Detroit when I was growing up. A fire is blazing from wood I sawed myself. I collected it under this home and in the neighbors’ bush, all dead wood laying around waiting to be burned, turned to ash, to be sent back to the earth, to cradle the dead and honor new growth.

I saw new yellow daisies on my walk and I passed them in sadness and fear of their power. In feng shui two yellow flowers in a vase in the bedroom will bring you a lover, but with only one moon cycle to go and no apartment, no job, no money to return to in New York, I chose instead four purple flowers outside my door, from a vine, a weed, a nasty weed according to DOC (Department of Conservation). In feng shui, a certain color of purple in a flower, placed in the right direction, which I’ve forgotten, SE or SW, will bring money.

It’s cold, and the walk was brisk, I wore my black beret, but I don’t know what the temperature was or is. I guess something like 7 C but I don't know what that means in Fahrenhite. It’s cool to not understand Celsius, to not pre-judge how I should feel before stepping out, and to let the weather just be, just tell me and it told me cold. However, it makes baking vegetables quite a challenge.

Oh, yes, I’m going to miss these walks, and this view, the sea right out my window. I’m sipping on tea with a kawa kawa leaf in it for healing and special dreams. The Maoris I am told use the leaf for healing... a little bit of it dried sells for $20 in a small bag at the health food store. It grows everywhere. I picked a few from the bush a few steps from my door, after walking down the fifty steps to this cottage, nestled inside a hill, which provides -- what some real estate agents call – a million dollar view -- but would be gone in a flash in an earthquake. Twenty-eight days. The moon is in Cancer. It was new on Saturday and in Gemini. I’m in Plimmerton, New Zealand. May 30th. My vegetables are done. Rather were done fifteen minutes ago, but I like them roasted this way. And the chestnuts from the Bleakeys backyard are also roasted. Or maybe burnt as well. The Bleakeys are the most fun family I have met in New Zealand. A family that laughs together stays together.